Beach Access

Re "The long haul in Syria," Opinion, May 29 The recent successes of the Syrian army are causing some to rethink their belief that President Bashar Assad's government faces imminent collapse. Meanwhile, our government and our allies are eager to see a just and quick end to Assad's oppressive rule. Support for the rebels has been limited, as we have mainly concerned ourselves with diplomacy with the Russians. Those who want U.S. military intervention against Assad must now ask themselves: What if this regime should come out triumphant and once again become the despised but legal government of that country?

October 28, 1988 | KAREN NEWELL YOUNG, Karen Newell Young is a regular contributor to Orange County Life.

It's not every day that you bump into a skateboard ramp while browsing through the racks in your favorite clothing store. Which is one of the reasons why the designer of Beach Access decided to include a ramp in the South Coast Plaza shop. She wanted to shake up the customers. But it's not just the skateboard ramp that commands attention at the 2-month-old operation.

Surf shop owner and former Malibu Mayor Jefferson Wagner attended a celebrity-infused Memorial Day party on Billionaire's Beach and, according to him, all the buzz was about a beach access story in the L.A. Times. No surprise there. My colleague Martha Groves' story that day was about Jenny Price, the activist behind a smartphone app designed to "help beachgoers outfox privacy-loving millionaires and open up the coast once and for all. " So what was the take among Hollywood glitterati, moguls and other luminaries at Monday's soiree?

The California Coastal Commission agreed Wednesday to a settlement proposed by entertainment mogul David Geffen to end decades of wrangling over public access to the beach at his Malibu estate. The 12-member commission unanimously agreed to forgive Geffen for mistakenly building a deck that intruded into a public easement over the sand in front of his beach complex in exchange for his opening a 42-foot stretch of beach that had been closed to the public.

A new smartphone app, debuting next month for iPhones and iPads, will help people locate legal but often hidden access points to Malibu beaches as well as places to plop down on the sand once they get there. The app, called Our Malibu Beaches, is the enterprising idea of Jenny Price, an environmental writer who has made a mission of seeking out beach access through some of the least accessible and most coveted land along the coast of California. If only Los Angeles County and the state could be as ingenious in helping beachgoers use those paths.

Responding to a growing trend among local governments to limit beach access through curfews, parking lot closures and other means, the California Coastal Commission has issued a warning that such curfews are illegal without commission approval. In a letter sent to 73 cities and counties situated on the state's 1,100-mile coastline, the commission also indicated that it will not approve any long-term closures.

A crackdown on Venice Beach homeless encampments and renegade vendors is pitting longtime residents and merchants against homeless advocates and younger transients. The Los Angeles Police Department enforcement efforts, begun almost two months ago, were spurred by mounting complaints from waterfront residents and business owners who said aggressive, intoxicated transients and violent disputes over vendors' spaces had made the boardwalk an increasingly lawless, frightening place.

On this Independence Day, with the presidential elections looming and the Olympic games starting in Atlanta, Americans are wearing their pride on their shirt sleeves, not to mention their ball caps, bikinis and boxer shorts. The spirit of '96 has caused a wave of star-spangled clothing and accessories. Old Glory is everywhere, unfurled across board shorts, T-shirts, ties, jewelry, swimsuits, sweatsuits, hats, jackets and socks.

A state coastal commissioner who vocally supported banning beach bonfires along a stretch of Orange County coastline has resigned under growing pressure from two state legislators. William Burke was serving as both a member of the state Coastal Commission and the South Coast Air Quality Management District, agencies that are at odds about whether the Southern California tradition of beach bonfires should be extinguished from San Clemente to Malibu. Coastal Commission staffers have recommended that Newport Beach's proposal to rip out 60 fire pits in Balboa and Corona del Mar be denied, while the air quality board is considering a regional ban on wood-burning fire pits for health reasons.

Re "Blocking the Way to the Beach," Sept. 3: You deserve credit for bringing the issue of dedications of land for beach access to the public's attention. However, defining the problem as a denial of public access rather than the acquisition of property rights leads to an unbalanced article. Echoing the 5th Amendment to the Constitution, the U.S. Supreme Court has stated that requiring dedications of land for the good of the public can only be done without just compensation where it is reasonable and proportional to the impacts created by real estate development.